Our developer will be working on RCF over the next few weeks. Things may look wonky at times, normal functions may not work or dissappear completely. It's the nature of the beast but we'll try to make sure this is painless as possible.

Well, in 2001(got the date wrong above - it was at the Millenium Philcon in 2001), the first three already had been published - '96, '98, and 2000. One every two years was pretty good. Then....the bottom fell out. Essentially, his initial plan for the series fell through, and he had to add a bunch of subplots - especially the stuff in Essos. And I think the need to keep balancing the Westeros/Essos timeline with subplots resulted in those subplots needlessly complicating the story, and it just got out of hand.

Hall-of-Famer

The Name of the Wind & The Wise Man's Fear - These were the first (and currently only) two books in Patrick Rothfuss' Kingkiller Chronicles. If you're into fantasy at all, I'd imagine you'd really like these. The basic plot is that a famous scribe tracks down an infamous villain and convinces him to tell his story over three days. The two books above are the first two days. Probably the biggest compliment I can give these is that I wanted to keep reading. There was really never a moment where I was bored or wanted to move on to another book. I'd definitely recommend them if you are a fan of Martin, Abercrombie, Sanderson, or any other contemporary fantasy author.

The Bands of Mourning - Another fantasy novel, this one from the highly productive Brandon Sanderson. This one is the latest in his Mistborn series. I found it to be generally enjoyable and an easy read, but not terribly good. I enjoyed the previous Mistborn books a lot, but this one just felt really disjointed. It never really found a rhythm and the humor felt more forced than usual. Still probably worth checking out if you've read the previous books in the series, as it'll keep you wondering where the greater story is going.

The Outsider - With Castle Rock debuting on Wednesday, I thought it'd be fun to read a recent King novel. This one was great, and quite a bit different from what I thought it would be from the description. Essentially, a young boy is killed brutally in a small Oklahoma town, and all the DNA evidence points to one of the town's beloved citizens, who also happens to have an airtight alibi. It spirals from there into some pretty unpredictable territory, and is never boring. I finished this one in like three days, which is the mark of an entertaining novel. It's a pretty tight read, not nearly as verbose as many King books. I'd highly recommend it if you enjoy King as an author. I'd recommend checking out the Bill Hodges trilogy beforehand, though, as this one references characters and events in those novels.

Needful Things - Reading this one now. Kind of surprised I'd never read it, as I've read the bulk of King's work. This one reminds me a lot of Under the Dome, in that it has a supernatural element, but the bulk of the horror is in the awful things that regular people are willing to do to each other with only the slightest nudge. I'm only about a quarter of the way through so far, but it's been great. The horror builds gradually as the Tetris pieces stack. You know horrible things are about to happen, and King leaves so many possibilities wide open that you've no idea what will happen first or next.

His name was Sashi Brown

The Name of the Wind & The Wise Man's Fear - These were the first (and currently only) two books in Patrick Rothfuss' Kingkiller Chronicles. If you're into fantasy at all, I'd imagine you'd really like these. The basic plot is that a famous scribe tracks down an infamous villain and convinces him to tell his story over three days. The two books above are the first two days. Probably the biggest compliment I can give these is that I wanted to keep reading. There was really never a moment where I was bored or wanted to move on to another book. I'd definitely recommend them if you are a fan of Martin, Abercrombie, Sanderson, or any other contemporary fantasy author.

The Bands of Mourning - Another fantasy novel, this one from the highly productive Brandon Sanderson. This one is the latest in his Mistborn series. I found it to be generally enjoyable and an easy read, but not terribly good. I enjoyed the previous Mistborn books a lot, but this one just felt really disjointed. It never really found a rhythm and the humor felt more forced than usual. Still probably worth checking out if you've read the previous books in the series, as it'll keep you wondering where the greater story is going.

The Outsider - With Castle Rock debuting on Wednesday, I thought it'd be fun to read a recent King novel. This one was great, and quite a bit different from what I thought it would be from the description. Essentially, a young boy is killed brutally in a small Oklahoma town, and all the DNA evidence points to one of the town's beloved citizens, who also happens to have an airtight alibi. It spirals from there into some pretty unpredictable territory, and is never boring. I finished this one in like three days, which is the mark of an entertaining novel. It's a pretty tight read, not nearly as verbose as many King books. I'd highly recommend it if you enjoy King as an author. I'd recommend checking out the Bill Hodges trilogy beforehand, though, as this one references characters and events in those novels.

Needful Things - Reading this one now. Kind of surprised I'd never read it, as I've read the bulk of King's work. This one reminds me a lot of Under the Dome, in that it has a supernatural element, but the bulk of the horror is in the awful things that regular people are willing to do to each other with only the slightest nudge. I'm only about a quarter of the way through so far, but it's been great. The horror builds gradually as the Tetris pieces stack. You know horrible things are about to happen, and King leaves so many possibilities wide open that you've no idea what will happen first or next.

Only thing I didn't really care for is the fact that he basically has told us nothing about the world the novels take place in through two books. There's just not the sense of a vast history and real politics like in Martin's works. I know next to nothing about the world, how it's laid out, how the government functions, etc. through two books.

All-Star

An amazing debut I read recently is Empire of Silence by Christopher Ruocchio. I see a lot of influences from many different classic and modern sci-fi and fantasy greats: a little name of the wind, a little dune, some book of the new sun and red rising... But he just managed to put it all together in such a way that it's amazing he wrote it all at 22. Not a nonstop adrenaline rush by any means, but the universe feels so authentic and the main character is the best protagonist I've read in a while.